How Catholic England Celebrated Christmas

New Zealand Tablet, Volume LI, Issue 8, 21 February 1924, Page 41

How Catholic England Celebrated Christmas

Outside the “great solemn abbeys”—as the great monastic houses were described by the plundering commissioners <of Henry VIII .—Christmas for the average lay Catholic Ibegins with the Midnight Mass of Christmas Eve. But actually the first ceremonial act of Christmas takes place many hours before midnight, at Prime on the morning of ■ Christmas Eve, when the monastics, vested in rich copes and accompanied with lighted tapers and smoking censers, gather round the great lectern that stands in the middle of their chapter house for the solemn chanting of the' Christfas Martyrology, which is always read a day in advance.. It is a wonderful roll of dates and events, this Christmas Martyrology. It begins with the Creation of the World, and it traverses in the most thrilling and colorful terms all the greatest happenings in the progress and development of mankind. Strict purists in chronology might query some of the dates; only a heretic would question the facts. And these events, with the numbering of the years ''that have passed, pass in rapid succession with an excitement that gathers force as the prefigurings of the Incarnation draw closer to that central fact in the world’s history. The Cantor at the lectern changes his note to a higher tone, and in the midst of his monastic brethren in the chapter house he cries aloud that'; “To-day, in Bethlehem of Judah, the Word was made Flesh.” And all fall on their/knees in anticipatory adoration of the Incarnate Christ. This is the first ushering in of Christmas, which takes place in many a monastic house of Great Britain on the morning of the Vigil. And, outside the abbeys and monastic houses, in the heart of London at Westminster Cathedral the lay folk assist at this ceremony as it is celebrated in the choir by the College of Chaplains. After this there followed the penitential exercises of the Vigil. His Eminence the Cardinal Archbishop pontificated at the first Vespers of Christmas, and later, at about an hour before midnight, the doors of the Metropolitan Cathedral were opened to admit the faithful to Matins, which preceded the Midnight Mass, celebrated by Bishop Butt in the presence of the Cardinal, at which the Cathedral was crowded to the doors. Prime on Christmas morning was chanted by the chaplains, followed by the High Mass of the Aurora. Then, later on in the morning, there was the Christmas Mass In NutiviUite Domini, celebrated by the Cardinal Archbishop, who was surrounded by the whole Archiepiscopal Curia, with gentlemen-of-honor and Jay dignitaries of the Papal Court in attendance. Throughout the entire country, England and Wales and Scotland, from our great Cathedral cathedrals and magni- ' ficent abbey churches down to the newest and poorest of the mission churches, there was practically not a single Catholic church or conventual chapel in Great Britain without its Midnight Mass. No going out into the highways and hedges here and compelling the people to come in. The difficulty was to find room for the vast crowds that would have overflowed the churches beyond their capacity, and so in every case admission" to the Midnight Mass was by ticket only. Cribs were everywhere, and one of the most touching of all these beautiful ceremonies of Christmas was the carrying of the.Bambino from the high altar to the manger after the High Mass of midnight. . But, for romance, in which-Nature unassisted took the most prominent part, it would have been necessary to have spent the festival with the Benedictine monks at their home on Caldey Island, off the coast of South Wales. The weather prophets had predicted gales, and their prophecies came to pass in abundance. Fierce storms blew up from the Atlantic, their ,bowlings vying with the thundering crash of bells from the abbey tower. Cut off from the rest of the world by raging seas, as the monks of Caldey were, the calm dignity of the beautiful ceremonies in their abbey church were the greatest contrast imaginable to the fierce shrieking of the wind as it swept across their island, or the dash of the sea spray as it was flung wildly against the painted windows of the monastic ( church, founded on the rock secure amidst the boiling waves of an angry sea. • ‘

Outside the Church Christianity may have failed, as; some of our modern critics declare it has. But the Catholic heart of the country beats true as ever, and the Christmas festival which has just passed has seen the Catholic; churches more crowded than ever. Which is inevitable,, since room has to he found somewhere for the ten thousand, or so converts which are added yearly to the Faith, iiu Britain. Catholic News Service. .....